AUTONOMOUS MULTI-AGENT ROBOTIC SYSTEMS

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The use of robots has been expanding from their principal base of manufacturing toward service industries, healthcare, and terrestrial and planetary exploration. In this context, multi-agent collaboration addresses the deployment, task planning, and control of a team of autonomous agents (sensors and/or manipulators mounted on mobile platforms) operating in a common environment to achieve a global goal, frequently, requiring effective human-robot interaction. As highlighted by recent collaborative Government- and Industryfunded initiatives, there exists significant room for growth in such human-centred robotics that would benefit the Canadian population in general and numerous key industries in specific. Our proposed transformative research on fundamentals of autonomous multi-agent intelligent systems and pertinent robotic applications is innovative, with numerous anticipated cutting-edge, first-in-the-field contributions. We expect to make notable advancements on two synergetic themes: (1) multi-agent tracking, sensing, and manipulation of deformable-objects, and (2) deployment and motion coordination of multi-agent mobile teams. Collectively, these form an important step in the convergence of the macro-, milli-, and micro-robotics. Sub-Theme 1: Our global objective for this Sub-Theme is to build on our past work (i.e., on active-vision systems and ultra-precision robots) for the development of off-line and real-time methods for the visual tracking, shape-recovery, and manipulation of a priori unknown, (trackable) deformable objects. The three long-term objectives of this Sub-Theme are to develop: (A) techniques for the on-line visual tracking of dynamic targets with deformable surfaces; (B) methods for deformable-object shape-recovery through active-vision; and, (C) approaches for robotic manipulation planning, including on-line re-planning in response to detected object-shape variability. Two example short-term application-based computer-vision projects are: (D) manipulation of micro-sized deformable objects, and (E) assistive robotics. Others will derive from our work on the long-term objectives. Sub-Theme 2: Our global objective for this Sub-Theme is to build on our past work (i.e., on multi-robot and swarm-robot systems) for the development of multi-robot team deployment and coordination methods for the interception of (untrackable) mobile targets in unstructured, cluttered, and boundless environments. The three long-term objectives of this Sub-Theme are to develop: (A) approaches for multi-robot deployment and coordination; (B) techniques for sensor-network deployment; and, (C) methods for swarm-robotics localization, formation, and human interfaces. Four example short-term application-based multi-robot projects are: (D) wilderness search and rescue (SAR), (E) urban SAR, (F) millli-robots for swarm robotics, and (G) AI for swarm robotics. Others will derive from our work on the long-term objectives.